Do we have maps and notes put away in the drop box? I can look tonight and see if anything occurs to me.

DrZ

Yep - in the "Adventure 2" and then the "Target Layout" folder.

Just throwing it out there - if you have questions, just ask, otherwise I'm just waiting on you guys to formulate a plan of attack/timeframe.

I say that not to rush you guys - just more for informational purposes

Could Grease run his drones ad hoc, or is he tied up in his "gather information" check? I'm fine either way, I'm just curious.

I would not have a problem with you running them through AR no. I think going VR might be an issue though.

Sounds good.

One thing I'd like to broach, but am happy to discuss IC: How many of us are going in? If it's not all of us, what's our strike team? As it stands, it seems as though it's going to be a tough nut to crack, and even if we get in, the odds are that we are going to have trouble getting out once we have the gear. I'd like to do it all quietly, but with this level of security that may be difficult- especially if they're on edge from a turf war.

I think Snap definitely needs to go in: She can assess auras, dispell wards, deal with spirits, and see if the items in question have any bad magical jo-jo we need to worry about.
I'm leaning towards having Mel go in; she can do a lot remotely, but she'll be much more effective if she can plug into a device directly.

Beyond that, I can see arguments either way for Jack and Grease going in. While I think Grease can be an asset from a firepower standpoint, especially if Rhex is in tow, he's somewhat of a liability in that department as well. Additionally, his main advantages (vehicle driving, fast talking) will have limited utility- I can't imagine breaking into a guy's house a mile from the road is something I can talk my way around, unless we have a very specific plan in that direction.

Jack is the team's primary firepower, and can lift the most. I haven't looked at his sheet but I imagine he's relatively good at sneaking around (also evidenced by his sneaking into the parking lot in the last adventure to steal the van). We also need someone there to protect Mel and Snap to a lesser extent from any serious opposition.

Speaking of stealing the van- how are we getting these things out of here? It may be that we need Grease and Mel to go in so we can hot-wire one of the target's cars to get the items out. Carrying them over nearly a kilometer of open terrain feels like it could go very bad very quickly.

Those are just my initial thoughts- I'd be interested in what you guys think. I'm also 100% cool with hashing this out IC.

In some cases, demolition can do the trick

Someone with a lot of logic can get decent milage out of demo 1.

Re: Strike Team

I lean strongly on the side of all going in. Grease is the only one I would hesitate on, but if he's not useful from the outside (say by rigging into a combat capable drone) he should be inside with us. Hot-wiring a target car is not a bad idea. Regarding fleeing the scene, Snap can summon a spirit that could both conceal us and increase our movement. Potentially useful spells: Invisibility, Phantasm (diversion, etc.), Detect Life (keep in mind the range is rather limited).

I agree with your assessment of Snap and Jack. Mel is a combat decker...she can handle herself in a firefight, but she is definitely superior in the Matrix, especially in VR, ESPECIALLY with the codes provided to us.

I would be fine with Mel working remotely or her coming along.

Yeah- I didn't mean to pigeon-hole your character, just going with my general impressions. That said, she is probably the only one who can pop open a maglock for us, which probably means she needs to come along. Is it the overall plan to watch the house til I get the stuff, then go in, or plan someplace quiet? I'm fine either way, but we should have some of this discussion IC. I can keep the wheels turning in my head on sneaky ways for us to get in in the meantime..


-DrZ

She can't though.. she doesn't have Locksmith. She can only hack the heck out of the place.

Just throwing this out there as far as the way the 5e Matrix rules work:

Unless you encounter a piece of hardware that is not slaved to the host, Mel is actually as effective sitting in the van as she would be walking next to you (from a Matrix perspective - obviously having an extra gun or pair of physical hands helps too).

Once you have a Mark on the host, you are considered directly connected to any icon that is slaved to that Host, just as if you plugged your deck directly into the device.

The advantage of having the decker along with you is that normally getting the Mark on the host is really difficult - a good host could defend against your Hack on the Fly with 12 to 16 dice, as opposed to just plugging your deck into a Maglock and having it roll 4 or 6 dice against you.

Also, since the host has no physical location, there is no noise for distance, only for being on different grids and the location of the decker. (Total of -3, and the Signal Scrub program and Datajack that Mel has negates that).

I thought the only Grid that mattered if you were in a Host is if you were on the Public Grid? I'll see if I can find that reference.

Strike Team: I'm not entirely certain on this one either... Remember when we all went in as a team to dig up the bodies of those Yaks? Weakest Link, yadda yadda yadda. Jack's not all that particularly good at stealth (I think he throws like 6 dice), Snap's invisibility spell was what made him capable. It basically doesn't matter how good or capable everyone is, it generally boils down to who has the worst dice pool since all you need is to lose one opposed test.

I do think we need to pull this off as quietly as possible, at least going in. Preference for it to be quiet going out. I think if we have to use any demo to get to the target, we've probably already lost. As long as Mel can get wireless access or a direct connection to any Maglocks, we shouldn't have any problems there. Since she's hacking it rather than picking it, there shouldn't be a requirement to crack open the maglock case. One would presume that the data access port is readily accessible without having to pull off the case.

If I have time today, I'll start scribbling on the maps we have to try to come up with the bones of a plan and we can go from there.

Quick note, I added two potential plans (four total files) to the Dropbox in a Folder entitled Jack's Plans in the Adventure 2 folder.

Basically, Plan A would take us through the Mud Room, sneaking through the Living Room, go upstairs, and sneak into the Artifact room. Plan B would involve climbing the exterior living room wall, using the walls of the breakfast nook to brace and for cover. That would put us on an enclosed patio. I'm not sure exactly how enclosed this thing is... does it just have a roof but is otherwise open air? That's my assumption. From there, we go into the artifact room directly.

I do need to re-check what Lobo wrote about the changes we noted between the floor plans and what the cameras showed us. I still think Plan B is probably viable, just may need to be changed a bit.

Jack,

Your assumptions are correct - the patio has a roof and a balcony, but if you climb to the second floor you can climb over the balcony and enter through the exterior door to the artifact room.

Great, I'll leave those plans in the Dropbox, so if anyone wants to take a look at them and opine, feel free!

I like both of them. We don't know much about the position of our opposition, so without that information, our best bet is a direct approach.

I like plan A the best. There's no climbing and it's straightforward enough. If we can be in and out quickly, that's our best bet. Speed will be important, I'm pretty sure we'll be noticed...

Getting to the house is an important question. And even more important will be getting away. I think this is our weakest point and where we should focus first. We'll need to get out of there fast.

I also like Plan A better.

I do think I'll serve the team a lot better remotely. Having the codes (and 3 unused Edge points), I can get you past most/all of the cameras, as well as play havoc with any wireless devices. I think we all want this to be as stealthy as possible...she can help make that happen.

I don't have a problem with that. I think Mel (and Grease if he isn't on the strike team) should be physically located nearby the whole time, though, just in case.

Maybe we can use a combination of wireless and magic for diversion, while Jack goes in and takes the objects or, preferably, simply to cover his exit. This is of course on top of hacking being the reason why the whole thing will be possibly done with stealth in the first place.

This is all wishful though, we need to prepare for the worse at every corner. Lots of things can go wrong, and we'll need to be ready for a fight.

Also, if only Jack actually needs to reach the target room, Plan B is just as viable as plan A, thanks to his physical abilities.

Hmm... that's true. I should be able to scale a wall pretty well. I'm pretty sure I brought my Gecko Tape Gloves too.

I think the main reason I like Plan B is that it is probably going to involve hacking fewer things than Plan A. While Mel has done a great job hacking up to this point, the way that game system is set up is that you aren't allowed any bad dice rolls or the jig is up.

Amy could cast Invisibility again and send a spirit along to help. Grease can deploy Rhex somewhere in a spotter position, although that may be a little tricky given the wall.

If we think we can pull off Plan B, we need to figure out how to get to the compound from the street. We may need to start looking for cameras on the fence line to hack them.

Apologies for being out of pocket the last couple of days. IC post is up; basically stating I like plan B. I agree with most of what everyone has outlined here.

How heavy are the 2 objects? Do we think Jack can handle carrying them on his own? We probably should have someone else there to cover whoever is carrying the stuff, since I imagine it will be tough to move these two big pieces around and fight at the same time.

@ All,

I've been lurking - I don't want to step in during the planning stages, I'll leave that to you guys to hash out - just bear in mind that whenever you have questions that need answers, or if you need me to advance time or whatever, just ask - I'm just waiting on you to finalize everything

I'll just put it out there that, from a metagame perspective, I'm not sure it's a great idea to have one PC attempting this by themselves. A spirit tag-a-long would be great, particularly to abscond with the stuff once we clear the warded area. That way Jack will have his hands free to climb/shoot. At the same time, there is a lot of potential benefit to having some of the rest of the team along. Snap can counterspell and Mel would have the advantage of spotting device icons based on physical proximity and do a better job than Jack would.

I'll check the IC and put those thoughts out there.

I think Snap should tag along, but not necessarily into the house itself, if it's not necessary. At least not in Plan B. Depending on her climbing is a bad idea.

Snap can summon other spirits on the spot, and provide a variety of support spells other than invisibility.

ETA: We're sort of at a standstill, so I'll urge my fellow runners to try to post something (anything) whenever you can, just to keep things moving. Planning can be difficult to do in PbP and I've seen more than one game die out in similar situations.

Oh and also, we should probably plan our holiday break while we're at it. I'll have less time and access for posting between Dec 23 and Jan 3, personally.

Apologies for my limited availability. I have been trying to check in daily. I personally will have limited availability from Christmas eve to the 29th, although I may have some MORE availability then, depending on what I'm up to; I just can't guarantee it.

ETA: IC post up. Not sure I moved the ball forward, however. Where'd we end up last time with our "tactical leader" plan? I agree with chrome we need to finish up the plan as best we can.

As far as holiday breaks, I am available in limited amounts throughout the holidays - there isn't a day when I can't log on at all, with the exception of Christmas Day probably.

We are a bit stalled I think that the planning stages are difficult to do on Pbp as Chrome said.

What can I do to help?

I don't think we've really had a problem with planning before, we just have too many unknowns right now. I think we actually have the house part down somewhat, or at least two potential options. We just don't really have sufficient detail about the grounds to really make an informed decision about how to get to the house. With the FlySpy running ultrasound in passive, it should be able to pick up motion sensors, possibly marking the general location of them for us. We need to figure out a path in...

I think we go with either A or B, no sense in doing both of them. Personally, I think Jack, Mel, and Snap should go in under Plan B.

My rationale for Mel going in is that she can use the Matrix Spotting rules to more easily pick out the devices we need to shut down or spoof. If we run across an unanticipated camera, it should be a lot easier for Mel to figure out which one it is of the multiple cameras slaved to the host if she is within 100 meters of it, rather than having to hack each individual one until she finds the right one.

My rationale for Snap going in is general combat utility and spirit summoning. Once we get the cases, Snap can always summon up a spirit to use Concealment on itself and whisk the cases away so we don't even have to worry about carrying them back.

One of the problems with taking so long is that we forget things that our characters wouldn't. For instance, none of our planning has accounted for the potential of lots of tiny dogs barking, a fact I only just recalled. I figure Plan B would likely expose us the least to any canine nuisances.

I totally forgot about the dogs. As an owner of dogs I can state that they'll hear us come in no matter what, basically. Shadowrun would be a much more difficult game if every place had a few dogs as security.

I'd like Mel to weigh in: do you feel like you'd be able to better contribute along with the team in AR, or in VR in the van? Let's decide that. Then we can determine who else should go. I agree jack and snap should. Grease can shoot, run drones, use EW and carry stuff. It may make sense to bring him; Mel can hack most stuff; Grease can jam anything else we run into.

DrZ

I think my main concern is that we get in the room and run into a maglock that isn't slaved to the host. Then we're kind of screwed without a decker on hand.

ETA: ...and yeah, the dogs would yap if they're aware of us. My four bark incessantly at me when I get home from work, even though they can see that it is me in the window.

The decker doesn't have the locksmith skill (please learn it at 1 before the next run ), so there's basically nothing we can do to go past any maglock off the grid, even if they're electronic in nature (I'm pretty sure that's right, and we might want to double check the rules), nor can we do anything about purely physical locks. If that happens, we'd need to take over the whole house and find the key/force someone to let us through before reinforcements arrive, not a small feat.

And yes, getting to and from the house has always been a big concern... I don't dislike the idea of coming up with some kind of story (possibly backed by some clever hacking beforehand) that explains why a car or van is pulling up to the house. It replaces stealth with: somewhat of an element of surprise, an arrival route, an escape route (more questionable, but at least a vehicle for escape), and a diversion if we want to use it just for that purpose. For instance, Jack and Amy sneak around while Grease keeps some of them occupied at the door and Mel hacks from the vehicle, which is within 100m of anything we need hacked.

@Chrome,

You would need the Locksmith skill if you are trying to bypass a physical lock.

If there is a Maglock that is not connected to the host, Mel could still jack directly into the lock and hack it.

I ran some quick tests off line, and you have the following information:

Your car is currently parked about 800 meters southeast of the house. The wall is approximately 50 meters from your car, and then another 750 meters to the house itself.

I've put a map in the drop box (in the Target Layout folder called Huiquing's Grounds) indicating the route the Fly Spy took, along with positions of the 3 guard teams 1, 2, and 3.

The circular area is the driveway, the box marked A is the garage.

There are 2 asterisks that indicate motion detectors that the Fly Spy was able to detect.

You do not see any unusual activity, so it seems that the Fly Spys were able to do this without setting off any motion detectors themselves or being spotted.

The Fly Spy would return after spotting the motion detector by the eastern side of the house, it covers the mud room door. There doesn't seem to be a way around it, you would need to hack the detector to avoid it picking you up

Locksmith is also used to "hack" maglocks if you aren't a decker. It's required to bust open the casing and use sequencers and stuff like that... but if you have a decker, they can just mess with it like any other device if they can direct connect to the access port. I guess some extremely high security places might have locked access ports that might require the Locksmith skill to access them, but I think that would be a significant exception to the rule.

Absolutely correct - I just meant that if Mel went along, the Locksmith skill isn't necessary for Maglocks.

I think we're on the same page. That's the reason I think it would be a good idea for Mel to come along.

ETA: Also, idea for Snap. Beast spirit to Pied Piper the dogs to get them to not bark and/or cause a distraction if needed. Not sure how well that would work if the spirit has to manifest, but it's a possibility.

Alright, so looking at the diagram, it looks like we would need to weave past at least one motion detector and two sets of guards to get to the house. We would have to tackle at least one more motion detector, cameras, and probably a maglock to get into the mud room. If we go with Plan B, we should be able to avoid the mud room defenses and only worry about the stuff on the second floor patio. We would still have to contend with the patrolling guards.

Maybe have Snap whistle up a spirit that could use concealment on us. Once we get to the outside wall of the house, she can cast invisibility on Jack. He scales the wall, Mel pops the locks and spoofs the sensors. Jack gets inside the room and gets the targets with Mel's help. Gets back to the patio. Hands the cases off to Snap's spirit, who floats them down to the rest of the team. Jack climbs back down. We make our way back how we came in. Grease provides overwatch the entire time with the two FlySpys.

May want to buy some rope for this if we need to get Snap or Mel up to the second floor patio.

If we decide to drive up, some things to consider:

Our driver likely will require more funds if we get his van shot at.
It would be an easier sell during the day. Showing up outside of business hours would require a pretty significant issue. Perhaps we could cause said issue? Hack the septic tank?
If we go during the day, there are going to be more people around, me security, it'll be harder to sneak, or leave the zone. Etc. Etc. Plus extra security could show up for the day of the auction.

I'm not saying I don't like the plan, just highlighting some potential issues.

My back-up plan was to identify the transport team for the objects and replace said team. We just never show up to the auction after picking up the objects. I am sure Huiquing would send some of his own security along, but we would probably have the jump on them.

I can get behind that plan, though Mel does not have any kind of climbing skills (in case that becomes necessary).

Where does it say that? As far I know the rules have drastically changed from previous editions. Locksmith now covers both mechanical and electronic devices (this is a direct quote for the skill description), and if you go to p. 363, you look at maglock (or keycard reader or whatever, for that matter) and it clearly says that the first step to bypassing a maglock is to open its case, using a locksmith+agi check, but it can instead be smashed or shot up... not very stealthy and it may break the electronics inside, not to mention that it states specifically that there may be an anti-tamper system on a maglock case.

So if the maglock is neither wired nor wirelessly connected to the host, for some reason, electronic or not you pretty much need to have Locksmith to do a halfway decent job. Same for anything not hackable through the network.

Unless I'm missing something?

I'm curious about where it says that there is a port in the maglock case. There's no logical use for it that I can think of. The whole point of a lock is to keep things out, it would be a tad convenient that for literally no reason at all you could just plug into them and hack them without opening the case.

A hacker does the trick only if it can hack the host and also if all the locks are connected to the host.

Btw, I'm not trying to be annoying with this, but we're using 5th ed in part to learn the rules, and my reading of the book has always led me to believe that for B&E, you now need Locksmith, by design, so I'd like to understand what I'm getting wrong, what I missed.

@Chrome:

Page 232:

Devices have a universal data connector, which is the
global standard for connecting devices together for
power and data exchange. If you have a cable, you can
connect to the device directly. Cyberdecks and datajacks
come with a meter of built-in retractable microfilament
data cable, or you can always buy a cable for about
five nuyen per meter (some devices, especially those installed
in buildings, are connected by cables to mitigate
noise). When you use a direct connection, you ignore all
noise modifiers and modifiers due to being on different
grids or the public grid. It’s just you and the device.
Some devices don’t have wireless capability. Usually
this is because the person who bought the device
couldn’t afford one that was less than ten years old, or
because they thought they’d be more secure without
wireless. These devices are called throwbacks. Throwbacks
can’t be accessed by wireless connection, so they
can’t be controlled remotely or get a wireless bonus for
being connected to the Matrix. They still have universal
data connectors, so you can connect to them (and hack
them) by jacking in directly.

Page 233
There are risks to slaving devices. Because of the
tight connections between the devices, if you get a
mark on a slave you also get a mark on the master.
This happens even if the slave was marked through a
direct connection, so be careful about who you give
your slaved devices to. This doesn’t work both ways;
if you fail a Sleaze action against a slaved device, only
the device’s owner gets the mark on you, not the master
too.
There are also wide area networks, or WANs, with
multiple devices slaved to a host. A host can have a
practically unlimited number of devices slaved to it, but
because of the direct connection hack you rarely see
more devices than can be protected physically. If you
are in a host that has a WAN, you are considered directly
connected to all devices in the WAN.

So from that, all devices - it doesn't specify certain ones - all devices have a universal data connector (even throwback devices that cannot connect to the Matrix wirelessly), that you can jack directly into, allowing you to then Hack or Brute Force a Mark on it. The rules on page 359 show what you would have to do to defeat each type of maglock (keypad, swipe card, proximity card, memory string, biometric) assuming you don't have a decker.

Remember that the only device you can use to hack these objects is a deck, and even the cheapest deck runs 50,000 :nuyen - it isn't something that the average person is going to have, and allowing easy diagnostics by technicians and other authorized personnel trumps the worry of a decker physically connecting to it.

That being said, it does mean that these items can't be left unguarded - you still need physical security or redundant layers to protect these devices from a decker walking up and sticking a cable into the device and hacking it directly.

That is the in game reason.

From a purely metagame reason, I believe they do this to encourage players who play deckers to join the group and go in, as opposed to stay back in the van with the rigger.

Also, not that the examples are always great explanations of the mechanics, but the hacking example on p. 224 shows a bank maglock having a universal port, which the hacker uses as an exploit to get to the bank's Host.

Cool I hadn't realized that's how it worked at all. Thanks for the explanations and patience. I continue to find a bit ridiculous that maglocks have universal connectors when they clearly don't need them on the outside (a technician can open the box and jack in there if needed). But we're playing a game, and it doesn't all have to make sense. I'm pretty sure if I ever run an SR5 game it would be a bit different

Well, in that case, we'll need to be at least 3 at the house. Using our driver and car to drive up the driveway seems too uncertain and risky when I really think about it (at least using a stolen car would be better). Not sure what we can do to get to and away from the house unharmed then. Stealth might not cut it on the way out.

I'm starting to like more and more the idea of running a diversion on the other side of the house while the burglary takes place. Something like faking an assassination attempt or something, maybe with a spirit and a drone (though we are likely to lose both..)? Phantasm and grenades could also work well in that plan. Is there a way to make this work?

Just purchased "Run Faster". I weep for any GMs who have to approve characters going forward. There are so many options....

-DrZ

Alright, so where are we at? Have we come to some form of agreement on a plan? We have a sketched out route that the Fly Spy took, so we have an idea about where random motion detectors in the yard are. Do we want to have the drones try to search out another path? Maybe one to the far side of the house in case we are going to try Plan B?

Thanks Jack

I don't want to be pushy - but we have slowed significantly, and I want to make sure we keep the game going.

Not only do you need to finalize the plan, but also when you are going to do it, what you will be doing in the meantime.

Can you refresh us on the timelines we are dealing with right now? I recall it was going to take a little bit of time to get the cases.

I think we should also look to get:
- Smoke Grenades
- Rope
- Autopicker (I recall we decided not to purchase one of these with group funds at the end of the last run since we decided against establishing a team fund. Do we want to see if we can get our hands on one now? We may not need it, but then again, we may.

Ok - so:

Jack made contact with Tara at 9:45, and requested the Mapsoft and Linguasoft. Based on the die rolls, the Mapsoft should be there around 11:45, while the Linguasoft wont be there until 3:45.

Grease then met with Stone around 10:30, and the rolls put the cases arriving at 3:30

So, our time line is as follows:

11:45 - Mapsoft arrives at O'Roarkes
12:00 - Grease finishes gaining the information from the locals
3:30 - the cases arrive at O'Roarkes
3:45 - the Linguasoft arrives at O'Roarkes

ETA - you could of course negotiate trying to find the other gear as well. Rope is legal, but none of you can just walk into a store and purchase it, I would make it the same as the cases, an availability of 1.

It's not impossible for Amy to find a quiet room to rent somewhere, and take the time to bind a spirit. F4 would take 4 hours. That could turn out to be pretty useful, having access to a second spirit.

As for the plan, we still have got no consensus on how to get to the house and away from the house.

We might want to designate a tactical leader for the run like we did before. Some situations call for executive decisions to be made quickly and not questioned.

I think designating a leader is a good idea. I have reservations about Mel trying to climb a rope, but she'll agree to go in if requested.

What about a distraction at the second end of the run? In other words, have the distraction go off AFTER we have the items, and need to get out.